Flipping trial juror might not appear

U.S. Marshalls showed up at the house of one of the jurors in the flipping fraud case to demand his presence in U.S. District Judge Judge Elizabeth Kovachevich's chambers on Monday morning.

But Patrick "PJ" George told the Herald-Tribune Thursday night that he was in Pennsylvania, taking care of a sick relative and would not be able to make it back to Florida by Monday morning unless the government bought him a plane ticket.

George recently sent an email to one of the attorneys involved in the case, alleging jury misconduct during deliberations for the three-month trial that ended in April.

George said in the email that one of the jurors used the Internet to research the case after repeatedly swearing not to do so. When George learned of the other juror's action, he acknowledges threatening to turn her in to the judge unless she changed her vote from "not guilty" to "guilty."

George also said Thursday night that he believed Paula Hornberger and George Cavallo -- two of the defendants in the case -- were innocent. But he said he changed his verdict because he felt pressure from the judge.

On May 3, the jury foreman in the case sent a message to Kovachevich that the panel had been unable to reach a unanimous verdict. After meeting with the attorneys for both sides, Kovachevich invoked what is known as an "Allen charge," in which a judge tells the jury to go back and reconsider their positions.

In George's mind that meant the judge wanted the jurors who wanted to acquit -- himself and an unnamed female juror -- to negotiate with the 10 jurors who wanted to convict.

And that's what he did.

He reached an agreement to convict the three defendants -- Hornberger, Cavallo and Joel Streinz -- on fewer counts.

Jurors often feel pressure when judges invoke an Allen charge, said Arthur Patterson, a psychologist who serves as an expert in juror misconduct cases.

"In effect, what's happening is that the authority figure in the courtroom -- the person who jurors think knows what's going on -- says, 'You haven't done your job' when, in fact, they have done their jobs," Patterson said. "The facts were presented. You deliberated and if you can't reach a verdict, you're done."

But when a judge tells a juror they are not done, that causes some people to change their minds on the verdict, Patterson said.

Here is what Kovachevich told the jurors when she invoked the Allen charge:

"Members of the jury, I am going to ask that you continue your deliberations in an effort to agree on a verdict. This is a complex case -- the trial has been expensive in time, effort, money and emotional strain on both the defense and the prosecution.

"If you fail to agree on a verdict, the case will be left open and may have to be tried again. Obviously, another trial would only increase the cost to both sides and there is no reason to believe that the case can be tried again by either side any better or more exhaustively than it has been tried before us,

"If a substantial majority of you are in favor of a conviction, those of you who disagree should reconsider whether your doubt is a reasonable one, since it appears to make no effective impression upon the minds of others.

"On the other hand, if the majority or even a small number of you are in favor of an acquittal, the rest of you should ask yourselves again and thoughtfully consider whether you should accept the weight and sufficiency of the evidence that fails to convince your fellow jurors beyond a reasonable doubt.

"You should not be hurried in your deliberations and you should take all the time you feel necessary."